Michelle Jones, Managing Director at Ketchup Marketing, explores what changing search habits mean for vehicle rental and leasing businesses. Following Ketchup’s session at the BVRLA Leasing Broker Conference, she considers what helps businesses get noticed when customers turn to AI for recommendations.
At the BVRLA Leasing Broker Conference, Ketchup Marketing tackled a question every vehicle rental and leasing business needs to take seriously: when someone asks AI which company they should use, will it recommend you, or your competitor?
That’s the reality of search now. People are using tools such as ChatGPT and Google’s AI Overviews to research vehicles, compare leasing options, and find suppliers. If you’re not part of those answers, you're going to miss out on customers even seeing your website, let alone clicking through to it.
The good news is, you can do something about it. But you need to understand what’s changed, and don’t get complacent just because your Google rankings are still high.
Here’s the first part of that good news we talked about: traditional SEO still matters. Your website needs to be technically sound, and your content has to answer real questions. Every page on your site must be easy to understand, and offer solutions to the users that land on them. None of that has changed.
The difference is that AI search now takes a much wider view, drawing on information from across the internet. Think customer reviews, social media, industry publications, directories, and other trusted sources. What those sources say about your brand helps shape whether AI considers you credible.
What that means is, you need to be able to back up all those big claims you make on your site. A fancy web presence saying you’re the best in the business means nothing if everybody else who mentions you online tells a very different story.
That’s where E-E-A-T comes in: Experience, Expertise, Authoritativeness, and Trustworthiness. These signals mattered in traditional search, and they still do in the world of AI. You need to demonstrate that you know your stuff, deliver what you promise, and have the credibility to back it up. And now, you need to do that across multiple digital touchpoints, not just your own website.
Start with the basics. Add named authors and biographies to blogs and latest news sections on your website. Make sure key services and product pages answer the questions customers actually ask, with clear FAQs and accurate information.
Second, look beyond your own website. Check your reviews, social profiles, business directories, and accreditation listings. Make sure the details are correct, and your reputation reflects the service you provide.
Next, pick two or three specialist topics where you have genuine expertise. Publish useful, original insights that demonstrate it. Generic content written to fill a page won’t cut it.
And if you're using AI to create content, feed in your brand guidelines and proper context. Check what it produces before you hit ‘publish’. Badly-written AI content is obvious from a mile away, and neither the robots nor your real customers will reward you for it.
Finally, don’t ditch the rest of your marketing to chase AI. A clear brand, consistent communications, and a credible reputation all help you get noticed and trusted. That’s the sort of thing you were probably doing already, so that’s another piece of good news for you!
There’s no magic that guarantees an AI recommendation. “One weird trick” to get seen in AI search results? Sorry, but it doesn't exist (did they ever?) Anyone promising you anything like that should be treated with a healthy dose of scepticism.
But what you can do is make your business easier to understand, wherever customers interact with it. When you strengthen the evidence that supports your expertise, you start to build a reputation that stands up well beyond your own website.
That’s the point Ketchup made at the BVRLA Conference. AI search is changing the rules, but the fundamentals haven’t disappeared. Businesses that take them seriously will be in a stronger position as search continues to evolve. And if you need any help with any of this, it pays to speak to the experts.
Ketchup Marketing are offering all members of the BVRLA a free AI audit. The audit will give you an indication and overall score of how relevant your brand is in an AI search currently, and they will provide some suggestions, hints, and tips on where to go to start being involved in the conversation.
